Keep the Faith, Mariner Fans

Here's a blog post about baseball I found from May 14:

"Alright, I'll admit I've got pent up issues stemming from yesterday to deal with here. I'm going to try to keep them buried for as long as I can, but I can't promise that this post won't veer off into NSFW or children language...Seriously, yesterday's loss caused me some real angst. I'm talking PTSD angst."

Oof, not good. Fans are riled up. Thing is, that's a fan from May 14, 2007. A Rockies fan.

Last May 14, the Rockies were coming off a 15-2 loss to the Giants. They were dead last in the NL West. And their fans were ready to give up not just on the season, but on the entire franchise as it stood. That blogger, at Rockies blog Purple Row, went on to name some of the ideas Rockies fans were entertaining--like trading Todd Helton, and getting Jason Jennings back.

Now, I'm not saying that the Mariners are going come back to make their first World Series, like the Rockies did last year.

That said, it's not as bleak as it seems. Sure, the M's have the worst record in baseball, but would you trade this roster for Kansas City's? For Baltimore's? Would you even trade it for league-leading Oakland's? I don't think you would.

The M's still have two of the best starters in the American League, they still have a young, talented keystone combination, they still have Ichiro.

The offense will emerge from their collective slump. (It's inevitable--as bad as the M's are, they aren't so bad that they'll average two runs per game. They'll eventually regress back to the mean, as the stat guys like to say.)

They'll need to stop making stupid errors. And they'll need to start playing together--taking pitches, moving runners over, just doing their part on offense instead of trying to do too much.

It's not hopeless--not just yet.